KYUNG BOK PALACE

The Combo’s always the best deal if you ask me!

Seafood Noodle Soup.

Plenty of seafood in here: mussels, prawns and squid.  I thought it a tad on the fishy side though the girls seemed okay with it.  The noodles are supposed to be hand-made.   They do have some bounce.  Rating:  4/6

Kimchi.

I love banchan.  I wish that Kyung Bok Palace would give us more of these little dishes.  I liked a lot of variety and particularly like the potatoes and kimchi.

Beansprouts

Sweet soy marinated potatoes

Daikon

Beef Bulgogi. 

Hm. Not so appetizing looking is it?  However, it was quite yummy.  Underneath that flotilla of meat and beef scum is a sweet soy broth that goes well with the rice.  It was a good portion.  Rating:  4.5/6

Rice comes with the Beef Bulgogi

Veggie Tempura

Salad with a creamy dressing.

Banchan: fried slices of sausage (kielbasa?) and marinated potatoes

Beef Bulgogi

Being in a mall almost ensures a restaurant doesn’t rate highly on Urbanspoon…it seems.  Hm.  Well, I think that the restaurant is overpriced for some of the stuff you get, but the deals are in the combos at lunch in particular.  The sushi isn’t good.  So avoid it.  Do go with a combo if you can and the meat is pretty decent.  I liked my beef dish though it was clearly unphotogenic. 

Unfortunately, if you come with kids, they always seat you at the same table on the other side of the glass display near the door.  The tables are placed too far from the booth seats for the kids to reach and inevitably they slide down their seats.  They have to lean forwards, sitting on their knees to reach their meals.  There is plenty of room in the restaurant and so we asked to be seated at a table instead.   The waitress directed us to a far-off private room.  The problem here is it was hard to flag down service.    Service was okay but could have been more attentive. 

I don’t know how authentic kielbasa is as part of a Korean meal, but I go ape over tons of banchan.  I haven’t eaten many Korean meals in my life and the few times I have gone, I have liked it though I’ve always wondered how authentic it was.   

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LATE NIGHT NOSHING AT THE RICHMOND SUMMER NIGHT MARKET

Spicy Grilled Squid Tentacles

When you arrive at the Richmond Night Market at dusk, vendors are busily readying for the rush. 

It doesn’t seem to matter how many years pass by between visits to the night market.  The vendors don’t seem to be selling anything really that different.  There were iphone accessories, sunglasses, cute stationery, colourful socks and even bras and underwear.

I don’t understand why they think people want to buy bras at the night market.  The thing is, it takes me forever to find even one bra that fits properly.  I have to go into the fitting room a dozen times with every brand possible and even then after 2 hours, with the help of a knowledgeable lingerie saleslady and a patient friend,  I usually only find one bra that fits decently.  So to purchase a bra from a night market stall where there are no changing rooms is something I would never fathom.   Besides this, all the bras were A and B cups mostly with tons of padding.  Ew.  I never find anything in a DD and even in a regular store like La Senza where everything seems pretty enough…they don’t even regularly carry small rib-cage sizes under 36.  It seems that the manufacturers think that DD means you need a 38 or something.   Or if they have a 32 or 34, it’s A or B cup.  What a drag.  Oh well, that’s my pet peeve.   I haven’t seen anyone purchase bras at these night market stalls either so I have no idea how they make any money.

I’ll tell you who’s doing a hopping business here though…food stalls!

Meat skewers smell so good!

The takoyaki stall is always busy and there’s usually a queue.

I usually look for the longest queue and determine that it has to be pretty good and so I end up lining up for it.  The grilled squid guy was really busy and seemed to be doing good business with all the people milling about, so I went for it.

You can order regular or spicy.  He tosses in some madras curry and hot sauce to the grilled squid if you order it spicy.  It sure looked good but it was okay.  Stomach said the last year he had it, it tasted better.  It was a bit chewy to me.

Strawberry flavoured eggball waffles.  The girls hoovered these up.

My favourite of the night were these meat skewers.  They had angus beef, chicken, pork and lamb varieties.  I picked just the beef and chicken.  They were so tender and had good char.

The chow mein was cheap:  $3.75

It was okay.  It tasted like something you could make at home…nothing fancy.

All in all, a visit to the summer night market in Richmond is a pretty good time if you're looking for good eats.  The takoyaki and the grilled skewer items are our favourites.  We always pick up some stationery items for the kiddies.  There's plenty of parking along the street but you can pay to park closer.  You have to get there early at dusk.  Along the road though were the juiciest blackberries ever growing wild.  We were popping them in our mouths as we walked towards the market.

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MEI JAN HONG SINGAPORE BEEF & PORK JERKY, RICHMOND

What do M&M's and Beef Jerky have in common?

They were both prominently on display at Aberdeen Mall.  The M&M's were not edible though.

Singapore Beef, Pork, Salmon and Chicken Jerky can be purchased FOR CASH ONLY!
See that sign?  They’re not kidding.

Located on the ground floor of Aberdeen Centre Mall, this jerky place moved from one side of the mall to this more central location.  They are hopping busy now.  You can watch them tending the jerky pieces on their grill as they add that nice black char to each piece.

My MIL thought the jerky too sweet but we like it that way so happily took her pound of soft sweet Pork jerky.

You can order your jerky “spicy”, “soft”, “crunchy” or “sweet”.  

I’ve purchased much jerky here before and Bib loves the soft, sweet pork jerky.  I found they also vacuum pack for transportation  overseas.  I asked for some this a few weeks ago to take as “Canadian gifts”  to California.  Since they produced salmon jerky in Canada,  I figured it was Canadian enough.  Hee!

In the central court area next to the fountain at Aberdeen Centre was this display of M&M’s.  Yes,  each of those little M&M candies is adhered together to form this Sphinx.  There are also Egyptian-themed mosaics and pictures all around the area depicting the "Boy King" and M&M styled Egyptian art.

Hieroglyphics written in M&M's.  Neat, eh?

Live music and belly dancers entertained the crowds.  This woman was spinning and moving so fast, my little iPhone4 lens wasn’t fast enough to catch her well.

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GUU IN ABERDEEN CENTRE

I don't eat things that stare back at me! 

Stomach relished it though.  He ate my sweet prawn sashimi. 

We have passed by this restaurant many a time and chosen instead Bebe’s favourite next door, Northern Delicacy.

Today for lunch, we decided to try something new and this Guu, located in Aberdeen Centre Mall looked promising.

Grilled Black Cod. Topped with garlic chips. mmm.

Lunch Combo #4.

Sweet shrimp, california roll, tamago, salmon sashimi and ginger component of Lunch Combo#4

Stewed Veggies component of Lunch Combo#4.

I really enjoyed this  veggie component.  The veggies were tender and absorbed the sweet soy stewing juices.  Yum.

BBQ Eel on rice component of Lunch Combo #4.

I am surprised I like BBQ Eel considering what it is.  However, it tastes like fish.  The teriyaki sauce is drizzled a bit over rice to and I never have enough eel to get all the rice down.  I left 3/4 of the rice behind.

Croquettes, grilled chicken and pickles component of Lunch combo#4. 

The croquettes come with a tonkatsu-type dipping sauce.    I did not detect any curry flavour in the croquette though the menu said it was curry.  This didn’t matter as I liked it anyway.  The chicken was tender thigh meat.  The pickles were a refreshing palate cleanser.

Lunch Combo #2. The dressing is served separately in the glass bottle and is spicy.

Cold ramen noodles with steamed chicken, sweet prawns, tomato, egg, cucumber and a smear of yellow mustard.  Nice on a summer’s day.  The main entree component of Lunch Combo #2.

Chicken karaage (1 pretty big piece)and california roll (2 pieces)

The Pickles component of lunch combo#2

This Aberdeen Roll has spicy sashimi, bbq eel, masago, avocado, cucumber, mango sauce and garlic chips, egg and teriyaki sauce. 

Mini chicken and fishcake udon for the kids.  They each had a bowl.  Perfect size for their appetites.

We ordered an extra dish of chicken karaage because Bebe liked it so much.  It was very good.

All in all, we were extremely happy with our experience.  The bill did not break the bank and the food was really good, creative and different from the run-of-the-mill Japanese restaurants.  As far as I could tell, everyone working there spoke Japanese.  The Lunch Menu Combo choices were a good deal.  The service was okay...I would have liked the waitress to come around and be more attentive at refilling our green tea; but they were friendly and helpful when beckoned. 

I have never eaten at the other Guu locations before so I cannot compare.  I hear they are better?  I can only tell you that this was a very good lunch and we were happy with the food.  MIL wants to come back again as she liked the black cod and variety.  We will have to try a dinner here later to see how it fares.

I wanted to try the Sake Mojito but thought it too early in the day.  :(

I noticed a really extensive liquor menu that featured specialty beers, wines and sakes. They even sell their own portable reusable chopsticks for $5.  I was tempted.  

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